Friday, December 19, 2008

Yeah, I'm Still Up

It's 2 AM. You morning people missed it. This was like that night when the people trapped in the mine were rescued and then un-rescued again. Basically, the media made up a bunch of shit to the point where they all believed it had to be true, only to find out otherwise and then have to write about the "shocking twist" which is only a twist if you believed the errors they printed in the first place. At this point I'm just doing news searches to look at the stories from before Henry called the deal off. (Or whatever he's doing--I do wonder why he'd come right out and say "we're out" at a time like this.) MLB.com had this up:

"Agent Scott Boras and the Boston hierarchy are holed up in a secret location, hammering out the final details of the contract that will swear in Mark Teixeira as a citizen of Red Sox Nation, according to a Boston television report." Whoops!

Sean McAdam had the usual 11 PM Herald article up, but quickly had to change it. I'll post most of the original article in comments.

As soon as the initial WCBV report came out, Gammons and Co. on ESPN came right out saying that the Red Sox were "making strides" toward getting Kiedis. I wonder if these guys just sit there waiting for someone else to say something (usually coming from an "unnamed source" or "someone close to the situation") and then just say, "Yeah, that's true, yup. Sure." And when they're not doing that, they're going against the first report--while using the same "unnamed sources."

So we'll see what happens tomorrow.

In the meantime, I've been watching the 2004 MLB World Series movie on the preview of the MLB Channel. Saw my buddy John Quinn giving a really serious "let's go Red Sox"--he was at the Riviera in NYC on the night of Game 4 of the World Series. It's funny--the way they edit it makes it seem like you're watching people at a Boston bar in between clips of WS games. But we know it's the ol' Riv. I was there for Game 6 of that year's ALCS, and would've loved to have gone back for the clinching World Series game, but remember, it's not like we KNEW they'd win in game four. Had I known it would definitely happen, I would've gone down there that night.

Oh, and I just found this article saying a certain airline will be the Red Sox' official airline--meaning they'll have all these deals for Sox fans. They'll have a sale for cheap flights from Boston to other AL cities for travel between: January and February. Great! I'll be sure to tour those empty stadiums.... another weird thin gin that article is how they refer to the Red Sox as "the champs." I'm all for that nickname, but I tend to only use it when we actually are the champs.

The short-lived McAdam article that he wrote before midnight (despite talking about "yesterday") and had to take down and re-do an hour or so later, painstakingly pieced together by me using the little blurb-preview that comes up below each News Search result (since I couldn't find a cached version) :

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"Think Big in TexasBy Sean McAdam

With checkbook in hand, Red Sox [team stats] officials traveled to Texas yesterday for a meeting with agent Scott Boras, hoping to put the finishing touches on a landmark deal for prized free agent first baseman Mark Teixeira.

A source with knowledge of the talks confirmed a meeting last night between Boras and three Red Sox executives - general manager Theo Epstein, principal owner John Henry and CEO Larry Lucchino - to further discuss the Sox’ offer, which is for eight years and thought to be in excess of $180 million. Such a contract would be the largest ever for a Red Sox player. The previous mark was given to outfielder Manny Ramirez [stats], who was signed to an eight-year, $160 million deal by the club’s previous ownership group.

The source said the Red Sox’ offer was approximately $20 million more than the eight-year proposal from the Los Angeles Angels, for whom Teixeira played the final two months of last season.

Teixeira has been the subject of an intense bidding war centered primarily on four teams - the Red Sox, the Angels, the Orioles and the Nationals. The New York Yankees, who yesterday introduced free agent pickups CC Sabathia and AJ Burnett at a Yankee Stadium press conference, were nominally interested in Teixeira, but sources said their involvement was the result of wanting to drive the price up on the Red Sox."

Nice job with that article. I don't know what to make of Mr. Henry's email announcement, but if Teixeira ends up going to the Nats or the O's, well, he simply wasn't telling the truth about going to a winner. Those two teams are anything but.Enjoy the snow, Jere. 12-14 inches forecast here, beginning by 11am. It'll start a little later for you.